Elderly couple scammed out of their home by greedy grandson

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. (FOX 11) - Helen and Hank Kawecki are being evicted from their home of 56-years in Thousand Oaks. Losing the house is incredibly painful for this couple in their 80’s. But it’s how they lost the house that hurts the most.

They say they were scammed by their own grandson. Helen Kawecki says, “People in the neighborhood told me all about it, but I still couldn’t believe it. Not from him, I couldn’t.”

Doug Emerson is one of the neighbors who broke the news to the elderly couple. He noticed that when Hank and Helen were out on Sundays with their grandson, realtors were showing the house to potential buyers. Emerson did some digging and discovered the grandson the couple loved dearly was selling the house without their knowledge.

Helen says, “I asked him outright, is my house for sale. He said, "no, no, don’t worry about it." But it was for sale.” Not only was the house for sale, all the equity was gone.

Emerson says, “He took out a loan of $360,000 then he took out another loan for $65,000. Then, he went to another mortgage broker, packaged those and took out another loan for $47,400 and he didn’t make any payments on that. That started the foreclosure going."

When the couple confronted the grandson, they say he left and never came back. Hank Kawecki says he feels lost. He says, “I’m hoping something will happen that we can get it back. I don’t know how, but you never know. Maybe the man upstairs will help us out.”